Consignment Shopping

Divine Consign is a gigantic sale of baby stuff that is held twice a year in Dallas. They offer a pre sale for 100 first time moms. About 6 weeks ago I came across the Divine Consign website and emailed them my information to see if I could get in on the pre sale. Turns out I contacted them early enough that I made the cut. The pre sale would allow me and a guest to go peruse the items before the sale was open to the public. I was picturing myself calmly walking around the convention center doing some methodical and intelligent comparison shopping since I was important enough to shop before the rest of the riff raff general public. I mentioned the pre sale to two of my friends and was concerned when BOTH of them said, "oh good, usually there are still some good items left at the pre sale, make sure you get there early and be ready to run". Hmmmmm.....

My mental picture of myself calmly browsing was now replaced with an image of crazy pregnant ladies elbowing and throat punching each other over the last Tickle Me Elmo. And women with babies strapped to their backs sprinting down the aisles of clothes grabbing any item they could reach. To make matters worse, I had invited my mom to be my "plus 1" but she backed out a few days before because my grandmother was coming for a visit. So now I was doomed to face the crazy mothers alone. I had made up my mind not to go at all. My original excitement had faded and I was now not wanting to wait in line and fight over used stuff that I didn't necessarily need in the first place.

The night before the sale Myers and I agreed that this really was a good opportunity to get some stuff for Owen at a great price and dear sweet Meredith offered to go with me. The game plan was that Meredith would head to the clothes section and look for fall clothes (since Owen has exactly zero clothes for cooler weather) and I would head to the toy section to look for a few items that I had in mind.

We accidently got to the convention center about 40 minutes early. It turned out to be a good thing because we beat the rush and were about 30th in line out of 200. Once the doors opened, promptly at 7:00, we walked briskly to our pre planned designated areas. I immediately found what I was looking for and picked up a couple of toys. The prices were lower than I was expecting and the items looked brand new. We definitely got caught up in the excitement of the event and left with the following:

1 activity piano
1 musical pusher thing
1 sit and ride thing
1 set of stackable rings
1 put-stuff-in-the-top-and-it-shoots-out-the-bottom-thing
1 musical hit with a hammer ABC thing
1 train
1 truck

5 pants
4 jeans (not sure why we got so many jeans, it seemed like a good idea in the heat of the moment)
7 shirts
5 jackets
1 Adidas track suit in mint condition

 

9 Months

Owen had his 9 month check up at the doctor's office today. I like to make the first appointment of the day in order to avoid as many sick babies as possible. Usually at the 8:30 a.m. appointment time we are the first ones in the office.

The first thing they do is weigh Owen completely nudey. At all of his other appointments I have had to lay him down on the scale and hope that he doesn't shoot a stream of pee at the nurse. Today it was weird to have him sit by himself on the scale with no problem. Owen weighs 20 pounds which, according to the doctor, puts him in about the 45th percentile for weight. He is 30 inches long/tall (93rd percentile).

Once the doctor comes into the exam room she lets us ask all of our questions. We love Dr. Han! She never seems rushed or annoyed and always answers all of our questions. Owen is right on target for all of his milestones and was in a really good mood for his check up.

I personally hate, hate, hate getting my finger pricked for the doctor to draw blood. They had to do that to Owen today and I was nervous for him. He didn't even flinch! I couldn't believe it. He also had to get 2 shots and although he did cry, it was only a little and he stopped as soon as I picked him up.

I know everyone says this, but I can't believe Owen is already 9 months old. Even factoring in the first few months of surviving on barely any sleep, the time has flown by. It is weird to think that 9 months ago he just laid around, slept, pooped and cried and now he is crawling, pulling himself up, feeding himself, "talking" (he says mama and dada), and smiling and laughing all the time.

Although it is a lot of work (duh) Myers and I are having a great time being parents! Owen is a laid back baby and is almost always in a great mood.

 

Labor Day Road Trip

At approximately 9:00 p.m. last Friday night, Mike, Meredith and 3 Levers jumped in the car and headed south for a weekend with Tony and Moe in New Braunfels. Although I was excited for our first vacation in a long, long time, I was very nervous about traveling with Owen. We originally planned to leave first thing Saturday morning but at the last minute I got it into my head that Owen would do much better in the car if we left at night, rather than in the morning. Turns out I was right. Owen didn't make a peep for the entire 4.5 hour trip and was even awake most of the time just staring at us in the backseat.

Our car ride started off with Meredith and I discussing work. After 3 minutes on this topic Mike loudly exclaimed, "BORING!!!" Which we took as a subtle hint to switch to a different conversation. We spent the rest of the ride playing "would you rather" with the most memorable being: would you rather have both male and female parts or no parts at all like a Ken doll? That became a reoccurring conversation for the rest of the weekend.

Saturday was a great day in New Braunfels. We started out the morning by walking around the Farmers Market and downtown NB. Tony was a great tour guide. He pointed out the world's first bakery, the world's biggest tree, the world's first German person etc. For lunch we headed to the Gruene Flour Cupcakery to visit Moe at work. We figured since we were already there we might as well try 1 (or 37) cupcakes. Yum. I do not care to admit how many cupcakes I consumed over the course of the weekend.

Saturday night and Sunday night I laughed more than I have in a very long time. At one point I almost stopped breathing because I was laughing so hard at a mental picture of a woman with no lower body. Ok, I realize that sounds morbid and disturbing but at the time it was very funny.

Overall, we gave Owen a 37 out of 42 for his weekend behavior. For the most part he was great!! He was a good sleeper and loved rolling around town in his stroller. We deducted points from his overall score because on Saturday he was a little "stopped up" (I will spare you the details) which made him a bit cranky. Then on Sunday and Monday he made up for lost time in the pooping department. We had to stop twice on the way home.

Turns out all of my anxiety about traveling with a 9 month old was unnecessary. We have such amazing friends that were willing to ride in the car and spend an entire weekend with a baby. Mike and Meredith and Tony and Moe all pitched in way more than they had to and helped take care of Owen which meant a lot to Myers and me.

Can't wait for our next road adventure!






Baby butt crack...